However, unlike duolingo, you still need to use other apps to learn the characters and get used to more complicated sentence structures. To achieve this, I use HelloChinese in combination with In Flow Chinese (for learning new characters) and Du Chinese (for reading) has been 3 times as effective than just using Hello Chinese for me.

I believe you, but I still have a full plate with French and Russian. It isn't even all that important right now, but tearing down that language barrier feels important given how many people are speaking it.

I wouldn't wait for the course to come out before you start learning it - it may take a while to come out and you'll probably end up needing a foundation in the characters before the course's content becomes useful to you.. There are plenty of other resources for learning Chinese online and on the app/google play store that I have used from time to time over the last few months (like during a commute when I don't have any wi-fi which i need to use duolingo), and I already know around 180 characters along with their pronunciation and basic sentence structure rules. I've found this method of slowly working on it on the side to actually be very effective and not really interfere at all with my learning of German, which is currently the language I am focusing on learning.

Whoops. Thanks for telling me, my mind was still on the comment above this one. But it still applies to japanese as well, as you could do the same thing by learning all of the kana and starting to learn the most important kanji before you start the duolingo course.

Isn't English the most spoken? considering that it is the official language of at least 5 countries(not including the u.s.a.) and the second language of several more. You can find tons of people who speak English in every country, not so much Chinese. Though it is probably widely spoken through out Asia.

Yeah, Chinese is the most by native speakers. English sometimes surpasses Chinese, depending on how fluent someone needs to be to be a 'speaker'. Languages like Chinese, Hindi, and Bengali only have a lot of speakers because their countries are very populous.

I can't imagine it will be that similar to the Mandarin course, actually. Besides the fact that they use similar ideograms (hanzi/kanji), there's pretty much no similarities between the languages. Phonetically, Mandarin is complicated but Japanese is simple, whereas gramatically, Mandarin is simple but Japanese is very complicated.

I meant the general teaching system, with how the logograms are incorporated and how the speech is taught. Those will likely be equal / similar, I'm not talking about the differences or similarities between Chinese and Japanese, but just the teaching method.

Is that confirmed or is that just a guess? I think that one of the Japanese contributors said that there will be a special Kanji practice mode or something, but I haven't heard anything about Chinese hanzi.

MaxJiang3 from the Japanese course page: "With Duolingo, you'll be able to learn to speak and read japanese, including its three writing systems (¡Yes, even Kanji!)."
And Chinese will obviously teach hànzì

Just a quick question, when you say 'just a little bit of time', how much time are you talking about? I am asking because I would love to help with Alpha Testing for Japanese (I have already filled out the form) but I am currently in school and might not have the amount of time that is required.

I'm in the same situation, but I assume it takes about the same, if not a little bit longer time than a typical session for a completed course. For example: having to gain 20 XP in the Japanese course. I don't really know though, since I've never been an alpha tester.

This is not the normal open beta we know, its a closed beta testing of some features that will be completely new to Duolingo, that's why they are looking for iOS users, because they usually develop new features for iOS first, such as Bots, Tinycards, etc.

Although I am disappointed that only iOS users get to alpha test, I am still extremely happy as this means the course must be progressing towards beta. May I wish the best of luck to you team Japanese!

How many Alpha testers will you accept? I'd love to help! I've been searching for a good place to learn Japanese, but nothing comes close to Duo. It's time to pay back for all Duo has given me. I can't believe it's really happening!

( ◠‿◠ )

ありがとうございます！

PS: I have a kind of very basic knowledge of how this language works, and i've picked some words (pretty words like 雪, etc..) , but i've never seriously studied it like i did with other languages here on Duo. I would be a good tester if you're looking for somebody with very little experience of the language, like an actual beginner on Duo would have.

PPS: i do know most of the ひらがな and I've learned a bit of Mandarin (中文)

PPPS: I'm so excited!!! It's almost here! Finally! Thank you all you wonderful people who make all these courses possible ♡

PPPPS: Oh, and now i remembered that Japanese was why I came to Duolingo in the first place! It wasn't available back then, so i started learning German just because and discovered my love for languages. Thanks again Duo!

I wish there had been a way of stating that I've studied some Japanese, but am still a beginner. I took a one year course basically, but given how challenging and different Japanese is from English, I am definitely still a beginner.

I'd love to help. Making a Duo-style Japanese course sounds like a truly fascinating endeavor and I'd love to learn more Japanese.

Presumably, they don't want to open the floodgates when it's untested. As Japanese has a unique character and grammar set, they need to see if there are errors fundamental to this. IOS is good for this testing as such devices act like it's a communist 1984 stormtrooper. Everyone should have the same errors. An Android could mean almost anything because it's open. Samsung for example messes a lot with the operating system (like TouchWiz) and even has models that generate an electromagnetic field for pressure sensitive pen input (handled differently from touch).

Does anyone following information on this course know how it will teach the characters? The amount of programs using romaji (English letters) or just kana (like children's books) makes me cautiously optimistic.

I'm interested in this. I alpha tested Swahili and I'll have some time during upcoming weeks. I have access to IOS devices, and I am able to read kana and some kanji, and I have very basic knowledge in certain vocabulary and grammar features. I already filled out the form. Everyone else who applied, good luck! :) 私は日本語が大好きです！！

That's not true. When a course first comes out, it is web-only. After a while, though, when the course meets their standards (hoping Japanese goes Swahili-mobile (Swahili got on mobile after 3-4 days of beta)) they'll be released into mobile. Mobile counts as both iOS and Android. Windows, though, hasn't been updated in a while. It doesn't have Vietnamese!

The estimated release date (at least on computer version) is May 15. It may be delayed (as most courses are), but based on their progress so far it seems reasonable. Version for other platforms should come shortly after that (I believe the iOS Swahili course came 3 days after the computer version).

That is what I have heard from some friends, that the courses are often delayed, but I was delighted to hear that they are looking for beta testers so hopefully the mid May release isn't too far off. I also heard Swahili went to mobile very fast, while other languages such as Romanian still is not mobile.

Ohh I've been waiting and now I hope I can help. Duolingo helps me get past my lazy barrier with languages so my Japanese can hopefully take off. I should add I have several iOS devices and some exposure to Japanese through academic work and self taught.

I am so excited for this. I've always loved the idea of duolingo, but I had never joined because I was interested mainly in Japanese and korean. Now that I'm older, I find I have an interest in other languages as well. This just puts the icing on the cake!

Why only iOS users? Isn't the android market bigger? I'd love to help but I can't seem to find a free version of the iOS diskimage so virtualization of this OS may be illegal. If someone can find a free version please let me know. Also, why not start with the web as a platform that way everyone would have been able to take part in the alpha :(.

I can't wait! This is like a dream come true. I learned Japanese to contact family there and take my mother to her hometown Hakodate. Duolingo has proven so well for Portuguese that I can't wait to see what's going to be in Japanese. I'll help with anything I can :)

I would be very interesting in learning Japanese with Duolingo! I have had plenty of exposure to Japanese language and culture due to my elementary school being predominantly populated by people of Japanese ancestry. The language captivated me especially after I took a few introductory courses on it years ago.

Can't help noticing - in this case, 勉強をする is correct, since "この" modifies "勉強" which serves as a noun. For example: OK: 日本語の勉強をします, NG: 日本語の勉強します。If there was not "この", "勉強する" and "勉強をする" would be both correct.

Thank you all for your feedback. I appreciate it. This is precisely why I would love to see this course being offered. It benefits both those who are unfamiliar with Japanese and those who are but would like to have the opportunity to improve it. It's wonderful to see a course like this being developed.

I'm not sure if posting here helps with your chance of being selected, but I'd be very excited to help. My Japanese is at around an intermediate level (passed N3 last December) and I'm in Japan now. I also have an iphone, which I don't think is too old (I hope). Anyway, I'm looking forward to trying this whenever I get a chance.

I just signed up to help, after being somewhat frustrated with a competitor's Japanese course I came here to see if DL had made any progress on putting a course together (I haven't been around for a while). I'm excited to help in any way I can, my iPad is my primary device, and I've been trying to learn Japanese through a couple of sites and YouTube series, but none seem to have as effective a system as DL. By the way, this is a kind of weird account...I signed up for it with my google account a long time ago and then forgot about it.

I would absolutely love to, but sadly I don't have an iOS device. I suppose I will have to wait. But when it is avaliable, I'll be sure to check it out and learn some Japanese - that would be awesome!! ;)

really? MORE stuff for IOS users only? next thing we know they'll be putting out IOS-only beta courses! this is ridiculous! i want to participate more for stuff like this but you guys have gotta stop catering to people with access to an IOS device.